Houston native's directorial debut looks at what family means

By Paul Brunick, New York Times

Published 4:42 pm, Friday, April 27, 2012

Photo: IN THE FAMILY

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From left: Patrick Wang, Sebastian Brodziak and Trevor St. John in Patrick Wang's film "In The Family." Wang's independent production was rejected by 30 festivals before its October 2011 premiere at the Hawaii International Film Festival and is now playing on a single Manhattan screen as a self-distributed release. (In the Family via The New York Times) -- NO SALES; FOR EDITORIAL USE ONLY WITH STORY SLUGGED FAMILY-FILM-REVIEW. ALL OTHER USE PROHIBITED. less

From left: Patrick Wang, Sebastian Brodziak and Trevor St. John in Patrick Wang's film "In The Family." Wang's independent production was rejected by 30 festivals before its October 2011 premiere at the Hawaii ... more

Photo: IN THE FAMILY

Houston native's directorial debut looks at what family means

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You've probably heard little about "In the Family," a remarkably fresh and unpredictable drama set in the American everytown of Martin, Tenn. This off-the-map independent production was rejected by 30 festivals before its October premiere at the Hawaii International Film Festival and is now playing on a single Manhattan screen as a self-distributed release.

"In the Family," which is now playing at AMC Studio 30, is the first film by its writer, director and low-key leading man, Patrick Wang, whose creative background is in stage acting and dramaturgy. Not surprisingly the film boasts more than a few memorable performances - by Elaine Bromka, Park Overall and Kelly McAndrew, among others - and one truly remarkable turn by the stage great Brian Murray, as a grandfatherly Southern lawyer with a voice as smooth and warm as a tumbler of bourbon, a role worthy of Will Rogers.

Yet Houston native Wang's slow-reveal psychological drama isn't just a showcase for his excellent ensemble cast. Beautifully modulated and stylistically sui generis, "In the Family" is also one of the most accomplished and undersold directorial debuts of late.

The story is both topical and timeless: a searching, present-tense study of evolving cultural values in the heartland and an unsentimental portrait of a family devastated by the tragedy of an early death.

Six-year-old Chip Hines (Sebastian Brodziak) lost his mother at birth, but his father, Cody (Trevor St. John), began dating again not long after. To the surprise of everyone in this traditional Southern family, including Cody himself, his new partner was a man - a man of Asian heritage, no less - named Joey Williams (Wang). Joey is a contractor by trade and a Tennessean by birth. He dresses down in duck jackets and denim and drives a red pickup.

Beyond some lightly comic meet-the-parents awkwardness seen in a Thanksgiving Day flashback, the members of the extended Hines clan welcome their new in-law to the family - some politely if uncomfortably, some with relaxed warmth. The exception is Chip, who openly and unambiguously embraces Joey as "Dad." But when Cody gets in a fatal car accident, Joey's loss of a partner is compounded by a rapidly escalating custody battle with Chip's sister (McAndrew), who secures legal custody of the boy to raise him as her own.

What follows is difficult to classify generically: It is too carefully distanced to be a melodrama, too personally specific to stand as a civil-rights allegory (an expected third-act courtroom confrontation is derailed in a fascinating way). What makes "In the Family" so elusive is that it is structured less by story events than whisper-soft subtleties of characterization and unspoken social subtexts. You will, for instance, not hear one overt reference to sexuality, race or gay marriage.

More Information

'In the Family'

Not rated

Running time: 209 minutes

Now playing: at AMC Studio 30, 2949 Dunvale

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The film's oblique cultural politics remain a tantalizing mystery. In interviews Wang has cited a meeting with the civil-rights lawyer Evan Wolfson as an inspiration for "In the Family," and one might see the film as a cultural conservative plea to extend traditional marital values and legal rights to same-sex couples. And yet the film's ending does not reconstitute the traditional family as such but rather suggests a more expansive and even progressive idea of what "family" might mean. Scenes unfold in contemplative long takes and carefully framed, deep-focus compositions. The style is too dramatically focused and pictorially unfussy to be classified as art-house minimalism. It is also too deliberative to be mistaken for a Hollywood prestige picture.

Though Wang's directorial eye may be untrained, it is extremely acute. One senses that he is rediscovering the rules of cinema on his own. This is a career to monitor.